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Illegal immigrant sent home to Mexico, still seeking care

Reyna Vazquez looked out of the window of her Savannah southside home on December 22, 2006 before going to her dialysis treatment.

When Reyna Vazquez, 22, returned to her native Mexico earlier this month, she believed she would continue getting the thrice weekly dialysis treatment that had kept her alive in Savannah.

That was the promise, as she understood it, from the Mexican Consulate in Atlanta. That's why she agreed to go, rather than fleeing to another state, where more lenient laws might have allowed the undocumented immigrant to continue receiving American medical treatment at public or hospital expense.

So far, that's not what has materialized.

The Mexican Consulate repatriated Vazquez and her 6-year-old daughter, Maria, on Jan. 5, providing them with a flight from Savannah to Mexico City. Administrators at Memorial Health University Medical Center facilitated Vazquez's dealings with the consulate after she received about six weeks of dialysis at the hospital.

As a young mother with a disabling kidney failure, Vazquez previously had qualified for emergency Medicaid benefits parceled out in three-month chunks. But last year, state lawmakers passed the Georgia Security and Immigration Compliance Act. It makes illegal immigrants ineligible for Medicaid, the joint state and federal health-care assistance program. Similarly, on July 1, the federal government began requiring verification of citizenship for Medicaid.

Vazquez's dialysis cost Memorial about $1,000 a week.

When Vazquez arrived at a hospital in Mexico City for her first treatment, she was told it would be less frequent than in Savannah, said her boyfriend, Luis Galarza-Chavarria, who remains in Savannah and telephones her daily.

In fact, her first treatment was postponed until Jan. 12. She was told not to expect it again until Feb. 8, Galarza-Chavarria said.

Continuing dialysis or a kidney transplant are the only treatments for her end-stage renal failure. After about two weeks without dialysis, U.S. doctors have advised her, toxins would build up in Vazquez's body. Fluid in the lungs could cause respiratory distress or even death.

"She doesn't feel good. Her feet are swollen, and her stomach's inflamed," Galarza-Chavarria said through translator Sue Martinez of Bridge the Gap Language Services.

The Consul General of Mexico in Atlanta, Remedios Gomez, declined to explain the details of Vazquez's case.

"She's receiving medical assistance she requires according to the authorities there," she said.

Gomez did say her office has received more requests for medical assistance since the new Georgia law was passed. In response, her office recently started a new program, in partnership with Atlanta-based St. Joseph's Mercy Care Services, to offer information, referrals for low-cost medical services and education on preventative health care.

In Mexico City this week, Vazquez stopped waiting for her next Mexican government-scheduled dialysis, and instead went to the private Santa Elena Hospital. With help from Galarza-Chavarria, who works as a brick mason, she paid about $180 for the treatment.

At the public hospital, Vazquez paid about $70 for the treatment, but she still couldn't get more treatments scheduled.

"They don't have enough dialysis machines," Galarza-Chavarria said.

Undocumented immigrants are flooding free clinics in Georgia in part because of the recent change in law, said Peter Doliber, executive director of the Georgia Free Clinic Network and a nationally recognized expert in indigent care.

He argues that making Georgia a less attractive place to get public services doesn't address the core issues of a broken health-care system.

"From the Georgia perspective, the law did what it wanted to, which was get them out of Dodge," Doliber said. "The challenge that we have is that we're not that loosely connected. When we tell them to go somewhere else, we're just forestalling our own problem."

Vazquez's plans prove his point.

Her aim now is to continue the treatments twice or three times a week until she is strong enough to attempt to sneak back into the U.S. She'll probably go to California, Galarza-Chavarria said. She has relatives there, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger recently announced that he is seeking to create universal health coverage that would include illegal immigrants.

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